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Join Rutgers AAUP-AFT today

Join the Rutgers AAUP-AFT - sign a membership form in order to have full voice and vote as we confront the critical issues in academia!

It takes all of us – scrutinizing and analyzing as scholars do – to monitor and protect our beloved university. As a democratic organization, we work together to defend and advocate for our common interests. Members determine the direction of contract negotiations, ratify new contract terms, elect leadership and receive journals and materials, including AAUP's Academe and AFT’s On Campus.

Faculty working conditions are our students' learning conditions.

How do I join?

Download the Membership Form (see PDF attachment above), fill it out and return it to Rutgers AAUP-AFT by e-mail (membership form scanned and sent to aaup@rutgersaaup.org), fax (732-964-1032), campus mail, or snail mail. The address of the Rutgers AAUP-AFT office is written at the bottom of the membership form as well as the fax number.

Please note that we no longer need the Social Security Number on the membership form; you may leave that section blank. Also please provide a non-Rutgers (a non-work) email address.

What investment am I making when I join?

Membership dues are just a bit more than the representation fee you already pay as a non-member, which is required under the New Jersey Employer-Employee Relations Act.

Switch from the fee to full membership today. Full members in their respective bargaining units are the ones who have the right to vote to establish the dues rate. Ultimately, this is an "investment" in empowerment as a faculty (at all ranks) who care about quality education and research as well as respect for our profession.

While the nonmember representation fee helps to sustain the union's efforts to fight for, and enforce, fair contracts for all of our faculty, joining allows you a voice in the union's decisions and to be counted as allied with the union's demands at bargaining and in-between when we are monitoring its implementation and taking up other key issues. Joining helps disarm those who would aim to drive down our working conditions and compensation by pitting groups of faculty against each other. As a united voice, we can exercise faculty governance. We are a member-driven organization--the issues you face need to be raised with your colleagues and strategies developed to improve our University.

Compare the small difference between paying the representation fee and union dues on these dues charts by rank:

Full-Time Faculty and EOF Counselors Full-Time includes tenured faculty, tenure-track faculty, non-tenure-track faculty, and Educational Opportunity Fund (EOF) Counselors. Dues for members in these employee categories are 0.75% of salary payable through payroll deduction on the biweekly paycheck.

Postdocs Dues for postdoctoral associates are 0.75% of salary payable through payroll deduction on the biweekly paycheck.

Teaching and Graduate Assistants Dues for graduate student employees who work as TAs or GAs are 0.60% of salary payable through payroll deduction on the biweekly paycheck.

Part-Time Lecturers Dues for PTLs are 1.25% of salary payable through payroll deduction on the biweekly paycheck.

Note that union dues are tax deductible under the category of "Unreimbursed Employee Expenses" when an employee uses Schedule A (Form 1040), line 21, or Schedule A (Form 1040NR), line 7. Refer to IRS Publication 529, which is on the IRS.gov website: Publication 529 for preparing 2015 Tax Returns

Rutgers AAUP-AFT is a union of academic professionals at every Rutgers University campus—Newark, Camden and New Brunswick/Piscataway.

Rutgers AAUP-AFT

has 46 years of experience

ensures access to professional working conditions and compensation

supports quality and accessibility of Rutgers programs and advancing the university to the top echelon of public research universities

is its members who continue to have the ever-fresh ability to confront the challenges in academia and devise new ways to articulate our concerns in order to work for the best possible result

Our advocacy efforts are stronger if our membership is informed and involved. By joining the union, your voice and concerns will be amplified. You can make sure we are heard collectively simply by signing up. This is true whether the position is grant-funded or state-funded or a combination of both:

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Part-Time Lecturers Speak-Out for Dignity & Equity at Rutgers

As part-time lecturers, we teach many of the courses at Rutgers - why doesn't the university treat us with the dignity and respect that we deserve? The corporatization of higher education hurts all of us.